Whitpain board OKs proposal to create traffic signal design

WHITPAIN — Drivers stopped at the traffic light at Cathcart and Skippack may have to wait a little longer to see green if red and blue lights are headed their way.

The Whitpain Board of Supervisors approved a proposal for engineering services for traffic signal design for the intersection of Cathcart Road and Skippack Pike at its May 7 meeting.

The vote gives McMahon Associates the go-ahead to prepare a design, including a traffic signal permit plan, a traffic signal construction plan and bid documents, at a cost not to exceed $5,200.

While a traffic light already exists at the current three-way intersection of Cathcart and Skippack, that point will soon become a four-way intersection.

“We are modifying the driveway so police vehicles and ambulances can come out to that light,” Township Manager Roman Pronczak said.

Second Alarmers Rescue Squad, which has been operating out of a trailer in the municipal complex parking lot since 2007, is set to construct a permanent station at the municipal complex adjacent to the police building and near the intersection. Officials indicated the official groundbreaking for the station will be scheduled in the future.

When the ambulance station is built, a driveway will connect the municipal complex with the intersection, allowing police vehicles and ambulances to exit onto Skippack for emergencies.

The traffic signal design by McMahon is required to account for the addition of the driveway and to allow for emergency preemption of normal traffic light patterns, according to Pronczak.

In other business, police Chief Mark Smith presented an awards display that will now sit in the police department.

The display contains several bars and medals that police officers are eligible to receive.

Smith noted over the years, the township has never had an official protocol for recognizing officers.

“We always had a kind of mishmash; each administration would do things a little differently,” he said, noting he set out to standardize the process.

A group of officers looked at procedures at other departments around the county and developed a system that is now part of Whitpain’s standard operating procedure, according to Smith.

A committee of the police officers’ peers review nominations and vote before recommendations for awards make their way to the chief, who can then approve awarding an honor, according to Smith.

Among the medals and awards contained in the display are those for combat, life-saving, length of service, meritorious service, being injured in the line of duty, unit citation, honorable discharge and the medal of honor, which is the highest honor of all but is usually award posthumously, according to Smith. Plymouth police Officer Brad Fox, who was fatally shot in the line of duty in September, recently received the medal of honor.

Smith said the display of the various medals will be in the police department as a reminder of what the officers can strive for.